A group of pastors got in contact recently, asking for input at an upcoming conference on the subject of re-igniting our passion for Christ.
Their letter concluded by saying that they were worried that their churches were becoming like those at Laodicea and Ephesus, mentioned in Revelation, lukewarm and losing their first love. But theirs are not the only churches in this condition. My experience is that in the more doctrinal churches there appears more correctness than devotion and in churches where there is more excitement in Sunday worship this often seems more to do with that particular church culture than genuine love for Christ.
I felt that this was too serious a matter to postpone to a conference and could not help feeling personally convicted and that I needed to put some initial thoughts into this column. What are the reasons that heart-felt affection for Jesus is far scarcer than it should be?
Self-esteem
One reason is that we think too highly of ourselves and hence not highly enough of Christ. Much of present evangelicalism has bought into the myth of ‘self-esteem’. We are told we must major on people’s positives and potentials. Don’t talk of sin and sins. Isn’t it the book The Lost Message of Jesus which insists that people are basically good? If we do talk of sin we should frame it in the language of ‘mistakes’ made. The idea that our sins are so heinous that they really do deserve the everlasting wrath of God in hell is seldom defended and no longer acceptable in some churches. The modern Christian tends to ‘flatter himself too much to detect or hate his sin’ (Psalm 36.2).
But unless the horror of sin is preached and believed in all its terrible dimensions we fail to see what Jesus has done for us, and therefore how much he loves us. The woman who wept and anointed him at the house of Simon the Pharisee prompted the Lord to comment: ‘I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven — for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven little loves little’ (Luke 7.47).
Only as we are prepared to look the gravity and depravity of our sinfulness full in the face will we understand that through the cross of Christ we have been forgiven much and so learn to love much. Instead of complaining when a minister preaches the grim reality of sin, congregations ought to thank him.
Self-deprecation
Our evangelical forefathers did not go in for self-esteem, but rather for the opposite — self-deprecation. Have you ever read these lines from a Puritan’s prayer? ‘O LORD, my every sense, member, faculty, affection is a snare to me… Am I comely? What fuel for pride! Am I deformed? What occasion for repining! Am I gifted? I lust after applause! Am I unlearned? How I despise what I have not! Am I in authority? How prone to abuse my trust … serve my own interests…’1 Knowing their sinful hearts so well, no wonder these much misunderstood men had such a great love for Jesus.
Isaac Watts wrote of Christ dying for our sins: ‘Would he devote that sacred head for such a worm as I?’2 When ‘worm theology’ (even in metaphor) is out of fashion, our appreciation of Jesus and our passion for God decline. Meanwhile heaven thunders its joyful praise for the Lamb who was slain.
1. The Valley of Vision, a collection of Puritan prayers and devotions, Arthur Bennett, Banner of Truth
2. From the hymn, ‘Alas and did my Saviour bleed’
The re-emergence of heavy shepherds
What would you think if you received a letter from your church leaders that read like this? ‘Are church …